jonathan’s blog

So begins our longest road trip ever.  From Kansas City to Los Angeles, via Oklahoma City, Albuquerque, Flagstaff, and Las Vegas…much of it on the historic Route 66!  The night before, Lillian and Wendy came by and dropped off snacks, candy, fresh baked cookies, toys, and a little ice chest.  They also spent time praying for our trip.  You guys are SO thoughtful.  Thank you so much, neighbors!

Mile 0.  Kansas City, Missouri.

Bye home!  John gets the whole house to himself.  We finally got our landscaping done…and it is one of John’s TOP priorities to water the shrubs and tress EVERY day, as they need time to set and grow.

As we left Lee’s Summit, I prayed over our car and family.

Me:  God, please grant us a safe journey.  Keep us safe, and help us have a great time as a family.

Bekah:  Daddy, what’s a ‘journey’?

Me:  A journey?  A journey…is an ADVENTURE!

Wow…be careful what you pray for!  An adventure it was!  About halfway to Wichita, deep into Kansas, it started to get dark and heavy with clouds.  It started to sprinkle.  Then it started to rain.  Then it started to pour.  Then it flat out started to just dump on us.  Then hail…like huge 1/2 inch chunks of ice started smacking into our windshield.  Gusts of wind started making the rain go almost horizontal, pushing us into the next lane.  And then a truly frightening thing happened…the sky turned all GREEN!?

I had heard from multiple people…that a green sky means a tornado is imminent, that you have an 80% chance of a tornado touching down…so run for cover!

And run people did.  Every overpass we went under, cars were bunched up, huddling together, seeking shelter.  We drove in the rain, hail, gusts of wind, and green sky for about 5 or 6 overpasses before Emily and I thought…hunh…we better take cover ourselves!

There was about 20 cars taking shelter with us.  Here is a pic of some of the chunks of hail.

Emily text the Exodus for prayer…we had no idea what else to do.  The kids were getting scared because the rain and hail was SO LOUD (except for Bekah, who kept asking me to just turn the DVD louder).  It finally let up, no tornado.  I googled the green sky=tornado thing…some people swear by it, scientist say there is no direct correlation.  Some say its the hail that refracts the light, some say its finer moisture that changes the color.  Whatever the case…tornadoes or not, green sky does mean extremely severe weather.  Pretty crazy stuff for the first 2 hours of our drive!  I couldn’t capture the green hue of the sky with my camera…but it was really green.

Anyway…we made it to Mile 184.  Wichita, Kansas.

A Super Target to stretch out our legs.

Boba Zone…I was amazed to find a Boba Tea place out here.  But did NOT have the guts to try it.  Been disappointed too many times.  Besides, we’ll be in lands flowing with tea and boba in just a couple of days!

Off to Oklahoma City!

I was so glad to reach Oklahoma City, I forgot to take a picture of my odometer.  I think we are somewhere near Mile 350?

We checked in…and found out they ran out of cribs.  So we asked for a room with a sofa or something for Noah to sleep on.  They ended up giving us the largest room in the hotel, 2 queen beds and a queen sofa pullout!  AND…the front desk guy offered to extend swimming hours for us, and privately opened the indoor pool to us after hours!  The kids had a total blast.  Thanks God!!!

Bekah wanted to test out the sofa pullout with Noah…so Kay gets a queen size all to herself.

Next stop…Albuquerque, New Mexico.

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So…years before we had Kay, more than 7 years ago!…we wanted to have two girls, a boy, and then another girl.

Along came Kay…then Bekah…then Noah.  And guess what!?…today’s ultrasound tells us that another girl is on the way!  Woohoo!!!

I would SO appreciate it if you joined me in this prayer:  God, please give us another healthy beautiful little girl.  PLEASE keep Emily OFF of bedrest…grant us a smooth healthy remainder of the pregnancy.

Thanks God!

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God was exalted today in dance.  Julie Meyer led us in some really joyful praise.  You can see it here:

http://www.ihop.org/

Scroll down and click on “LIVE: The Prayer Room 24/7 LIVE Webstream”.

Then click on “The Prayer Room Archives”

Then click on “10:00AM Thu May 27th”

Move the slider out to about 1 hour, 34 minutes - and you’ll see Julie call out a dancer and the kids to come up and worship.

By 1 hour, 47 minutes - the whole place is going nuts.  The kids are all on stage, Jonathan Rizzo is breaking out in some crazy prophetic song about the marriage supper of the lamb, and the room is just going for it.  Kay, Bekah, and Juli are all on stage having a blast.

A small taste of the joy set before us!!!

Thanks for leading us Julie Meyer!  There is no doubt, a very special place here and in the age to come, for you to still be leading us!

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Who would have thought?  Kansas City?!

America’s Top 10 Underrated Cities - Yahoo Travel

Kansas City

With downtown’s multi-billion dollar face-lift, pedestrian-friendly boulevards, and claim to having the most fountains of any city outside of Rome, Kansas City is definitely deserving of buzz. Plus, history buffs can learn about the underrated city’s pioneer roots at the Arabia Steamboat Museum, while sports fans can visit the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, a tribute to the excellent athletes forced to play in segregated leagues. Blues and jazz clubs also abound in this city where musicians like Count Basie and Charlie Parker got their start, particularly in the historic 18th and Vine District, where the American Jazz Museum is located. For some summertime family fun, head to mega-water park Schlitterbahn Vacation Village, which debuted in July 2009 as the brand’s first venture outside of Texas. Once you’ve worked up an appetite, you’re also in for a treat, as this Midwestern city also boasts some of the country’s best barbecue.

What!?  No mention of IHOP?!

Along with:  Providence, Portland, Baltimore, Fort Lauderdale, Houston, Louisville, Minneapolis, Pittsburgh, and Sacramento.

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Crepes in KC!!!  For my birthday last week, Emily found this really fun crepe place.  Savory and sweet…it was delicious!

They even have little furniture for little people!

Since the girls were in school and missed out the first time…we went again.

There has been a flurry of new construction going on.  They just finished 2 and are working on 4 more, all within a block or two of our home.  With all the building materials being used, our neighbors have been running around collecting waste and leftover parts…and have been doing their own construction.  Kay and Bekah joined them for a day.  I’m not sure exactly what they are making.  Sometimes it looks like a single family residence, sometimes it looks like a boat.  Anyway, Kay and Bekah mashed up chalk, mixed it with water, and attempted to “paint” the new build.

Noah’s been busy building stuff too.  Recently he’s been building his train tracks everywhere, in our room, in his room, on the table, on the floor.  Here is a SUPER long one.

The Koreans are coming!  This is the Korean Passion for Jesus week…and IHOP has seriously ramped up for it.  Estimates are up to 800 Koreans coming in for this!  Today, for the 10:00am prayer set, a lot of the worship and prayer was in Korean.  It was a seriously POWERFUL time singing and praying in parallel with a different language.

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Oh my goodness.  As of 5/3, I’m now 35 years old!  35!?  In just 20 short years, I’ll be able to order from that last page of the menu, the over 55 deals.  So much to look forward to!  Anyways, John, the Yap’s, the Young’s, and the Shao kids came over to celebrate.  Yup…most of my birthday party attendees were under the age of 15!  Here was our delicious White Chocolate Raspberry Truffle Cheesecake…yum!

I don’t have pics of the adults…but I stole some pics of the kids from Lillian’s site.  Here they are, and there are a lot of them!

As we get older, we all have to really think about being healthy and really watching what we eat.  So, in line with those thoughts here I am, BBQing vegetable skewers.  In honor of my 35 year birthday, we all had a complete vegetarian dinner celebration.

Just kidding.  Did anyone believe that?!  A vegetarian BBQ?!  Is there even such a thing?

John ate half the steak as it was coming off the grill.  I could hear Mitch enjoying bites from inside.  And Keith lamented when he found out I threw out the bones from our T-Bones.  But…I’ve got documented proof that Kay REALLY enjoyed her dinner as well.

So much that she started eating IN THE FOOD LINE!!!

Happy Birthday to me!

Yesterday…was Mother’s Day.  It all started off with Kay and Bekah surprising Emily with a little Mother’s Day project…one that I actually had nothing to do with.  Somehow they got a hold of an empty diaper.com box, and made her a couch!  A mother’s day loveseat, complete with hearts, pictures of our family, and lots and lots of love.

Next stop, Sweet Tomato (Souplantation).  Happy Mother’s Day to Emily, Lillian, and Wendy!  Haha, 15 Asians spread across three tables…we were quite the site!

Dinner was at Joe’s Crabshack.  Check out Emily’s Happy Mother’s Day crab bib.  Don’t these two look alike?…and it’s not just the bibs.

The rest of us…

Eat at Joe’s!  I had a Cajun steampot, that was SO GOOD.

Next stop, Cold Stones.

Last stop, the Global Prayer Room.  What better way to end a mother’s day celebration!

Happy Mother’s Day, Emily.  You are the best.

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Now that the bday blast is done, we took some studio pics!  Here is the 7 year old, the 5 year old, and the two year old!

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Except for the past couple of stormy/rainy days…the weather out here has been really nice!  For the first time ever, we took out the kids’ lawn chairs and set them up.  Here they are lounging in the warm sun…

If the weather is good, and I’ve got all the allergy medicine in place, we have a nature trail less than 2 blocks from our home.

Emily taking a break.

So…a couple of things recently happened that I think might have our neighbors questioning what kind of people we are…

First…the fence.  A lot of the houses here, have no fences!  Everyone’s yard just kinds of blends into the next person’s yard.  it’s great for the kids when they want to play with the neighborhood kids.  It’s also great when we just want to cut through and get to the Yap’s super fast.  BUT, what about those times you just want a little privacy?…or the possibility of sending the kids out to play with minimal supervision?  For that, you need a fence!  Our fence went up a couple of weeks ago.  I’m not sure how the neighbor’s like it…but I LOVE it.

Second…there was this instance of a misunderstood crises…

One evening, before embarking on another Nature Trail excursion, we saw a neighbor running from one house to another, yelling, “Help!  Help!  Help!”  A couple of dogs were chasing her, so I figured the poor girl was just running from the over-excited dogs.

A few minutes later, I’m telling Noah to check out the cool fire truck and ambulance.

A few seconds later, and the emergency vehicles are pulling into OUR street!  And then the truth begins to sink in.  That neighbor that was running from the dogs yelling for help…the dogs were WITH her, not chasing her!  She was running to a neighbor’s home, screaming for someone to ASSIST her!!!  All the while, my kids and I just watched this unfolding in front of us, having no idea that an emergency was happening INSIDE the house.  Wow.  I felt so lame afterward.  Our neighbor was probably wondering why I was just watching and not actually helping!

Which brings us to point number three…

Chloe, the neighborhood dog.  Chloe is this tiny, cute, little dog that barks at everyone and is super hyper.  Kay and Bekah are terrified of her, they run from her in terror upon first sight.  Noah on the other hand chases her down.  (God forbid he ever catches her, I’m not sure what he’ll do!)  Anyway, Bekah has seen/heard me talk about basketball, and how you ’shoot’ the ball.

So, we were out in the Yap’s blended yard, Benny and I, throwing the football across and through the different neighbors’ yards.  And the whole incident unfolds in slow motion.  Kay and Bekah are swinging on the Yap’s playground.  Chloe comes running out.  Chloe’s owner opens the door to call her to come back in.  Benny and I throwing the football.  And Bekah has the bright idea of throwing the ball towards the dog to scare it away…but what actually comes OUT OF HER MOUTH, at the top of her little lungs, echoing between the houses for all to hear, “Daddy!  Shoot the dog!  Shoot the dog!  Shoot the dog, Daddy!”

Wow.  Benny and I stared at each other in horror.  The owner gets Chloe and goes inside.  And to add insult to injury, Kay begins to chime in, “Yeah daddy!  Shoot the dog!”  I’m not sure how I can ever explain that one away.

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